Identification of superior donor parents for drought tolerance and yield through combining ability analysis in groundnut

Combining ability analysis of physiological and yield traits was conducted involving eight parents of groundnut in all possible combinations excluding reciprocals. The mean squares for both general combining abUity and specific combining ability were significant for all the characters. This indicated the involvement of both additive and non-additive gene action in the inheritance of characters. In general high magnitude of general combining ability variance depicted the greater importance of additive gene action in the inheritance of traits. Parents, JUG-37, JUG-43 and TIR-46 emerged as desirable general combiners. The crosses, K-134 × JUG-43, K-134 × JL-24 and TIR-46 × JAL-6 were the most desirable specific combinations for pod yield and for other physiological and yield attributes.